This past weekend was a real nice winter trial at Magnolia Farms. The sheep were a uniform group of lambs....some worked, some never worked...but sorted so each dog got a little of each. The field was not huge...but was loaded with complications that must be address. Dog-legged fetch, changing draws, and a bit of terrain...plus shed/pen/single if a person got that far. The judge was a good one, for sure!
Sally was feeling fine and certain she did not need no stinkin' handler. I walked. I loved my Nell.....always will. She is trying really hard for me so now I need to adjust me. I am most certainly a work in progress. I played with some ideas that came from my Scott lesson and liked the result.... though my Nell was a little confused in the change in me...I'll stick with the change as I work with her to help build it into how we run.
Having recently moved Bella to open, a couple of ideas stick in my brain. One is that she is doing pretty well and though sometimes she reverts back to a little tension, she is settling down just as quick. The second is that she is learning and needs freedom to experience time and miles. Last year, Nell gripped out twice on lambs at the regionals. Now a full year later, after providing plenty of experience, she has learned to work them. I (and my friends) remind myself to not get upset with imperfection....give Bella room to learn. Third is my confession from the shedding clinic, I did not introduce Bella to shedding with a good concrete foundation...hence her shed needs to go back to basics. I felt these lambs were a good challenge to shed....especially because of the whole lamb experience on the course. No excuses from me, the shed did not end well...but I could see the progress in our relationship as there was no tension grip and she did come through. What I did see was a dog that was trying to understand but was in over her head and a handler that should have set it up a little better for success on a new-to-open dog. I also was pretty happy with myself for not yelling at her while she was in over her head. That, to Bella, is like gasoline on a small match.....the ending might have been much different in a tragic sort of way.
I am thankful for the winter trials....I walk away with a box of ideas on how to present information to my dogs, in as many ways as I can creatively come up with, to sort out training and build effective communication. For Bella, we will continue with the shedding program and add in some close, tight fence work. I'll continue to work her on lambs when given the opportunity but I won't make her binge on them. I'll keep to my goal of a tension free dog and continue assessing, not only what needs work between us, but also celebrating what is working well and the improvements that have been made along the way. I will also push myself to make sure I am seeing the journey with absolute truth....not glamorising the bad nor diminishing the progress....nor putting judgement value to either side but being good with what it is. Ninja/Zen/Jedi at its best.
Seize the Day!
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